Endorsing Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, two former EPA chiefs, both Republicans, are warning that Donald Trump’s energy policy “would set the world back decades.”

William D. Ruckelshaus, head of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under Presidents Nixon and Reagan, and William K. Reilly, EPA Chief under George H. W. Bush, signed the joint statement released last week on Clinton’s campaign website. In it, the two GOP EPA directors state that “Donald Trump has shown a profound ignorance of science and of the public health issues embodied in our environmental laws.”

Trump Threatens to Destroy GOP Environmental Protections

Ruckelshaus and Reilly warn that Trump is threatening to destroy Republicans’ positive contributions to environmental protection.

“He hasn’t a clue about Republicans’ historic contributions to science-driven environmental policy,” the directors criticize. GOP contributions cited in the statement include “the incontestable environmental improvements in the restored lakes and rivers, the acid rain controls, the reduction of key air pollutants by 70, 80 and 90 per cent, and the sharp decline in pollution from automobiles even as their numbers more than doubled.”

It was Republican President Richard Nixon who founded the EPA in 1970, with William Ruckelshaus appointed as the agency’s first director. 1970 also ushered in the Clean Air Act, from which stems all of today’s policies phasing out coal pollution.

Revolting Against Trump’s Pledged Energy Revolution

This latest GOP endorsement for Clinton was triggered by Trump’s recent controversial economic speech in which plans for an “energy revolution” were revealed. Although widely disparaged, Trump claims his economic plan would create more than 500,000 jobs a year and generate more than $100bn a year in growth.

Reiterating pledges made back in May, Trump promises to repeal all “job-killing” environmental regulations, including President Obama’s capstone Clean Power Plan. Leading the pack of climate deniers, Trump also wants to kill the Clean Water Rule and end the moratorium on new coal mining permits on federal land.

Reilly and Ruckelshaus declare, “We Republicans should be shocked, outraged even, at the prospect that all this progress, this legacy will be repudiated and rolled back by Donald Trump.” Shocked, outraged, and revolted, even.

GOP EPA Chiefs on Climate Change: “The Singular Health and Environmental Threat to the World Today”

Ruckelshaus and Reilly state, “That Trump would call climate change a hoax — the singular health and environmental threat to the world today — flies in the face of overwhelming international science and the public conviction and commitment of almost 200 national governments that adopted the Paris Agreement on climate change in December 2015.”

“Our leadership was essential to that agreement,” the two Republican EPA chiefs point out. “To back away now, as Trump wants to do, would set the world back decades — years we could never recover. The young people in this country deserve far better than that as our legacy.”

It’s Such a Joke

In January 2016, Trump backed off his ‘Chinese hoax’ stance a little bit. After Bernie Sanders noted Trump’s position on climate change, Trump responded by calling his (ignorant, racist) statement a “joke.” Making even more of an ignorant, racist joke of himself, Trump told Fox & Friends:

“Well, I think the climate change is just a very, very expensive form of tax. A lot of people are making a lot of money. I know much about climate change. I’d be — received environmental awards. And I often joke that this is done for the benefit of China. Obviously, I joke. But this is done for the benefit of China, because China does not do anything to help climate change. They burn everything you could burn; they couldn’t care less. They have very — you know, their standards are nothing. But they — in the meantime, they can undercut us on price. So it’s very hard on our business.”

Spoken like a drunk a-hole … is this all a GOP Commander-in-Chief has to offer these days?

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